See those four things over on the left? Those are fasteners. They should be clamped on to dumbbell bars, and not your penis. One poor soul missed that memo.

A California man decided to put one of those around his penis, hoping the extra weight would give him a little more length. Actual quote: "This will make me the chief of my tribe." So, yeah, that's what we're dealing with here. Also, keep in mind he waited two or three days to call the police.

The device got stuck, and he couldn't remove it. The penis had blackened and swollen to five times its normal size, authorities said. In order to remove the ring, firefighters had to use a saw to cut through it.

...

The steel collar-like fastener cut off circulation to the man's penis, said Capt. Dave Kearley. As a result, blood could not flow out of it, and it swelled to the point that the man couldn't remove the ring, Kearley said.

Broussard added that doctors at Hoag had told the man, who refused immediate treatment, that if he waited any longer to remove the fastener, the flesh in his penis would die.

Good god. If you're not crossing your legs right now, there's something wrong with you.

The [fire]men constructed a watering system to keep the sparks from the sawing - which were flying half-way across the room - from injuring the patient as they cut through the inch-thick ring around his penis.

The delicate procedure took two hours.

"They also slid a little piece of metal between the collar and his thing, so if it slipped past it wouldn't hit his thing," Broussard said.

Yes, it's story so absurd that it's reduced a grown man, a government employee, to referring to a penis as "his thing." It's also reduced me to a quivering puddle of horror.